Arabian Deception

by James Lawrence

  At one fifteen, the aircraft descended to ten thousand feet after clearing Kuwait International Airport air traffic control. Pat checked his NAVAID to confirm the location as the ramp was opened by the aircrew. The static line from the cargo parachute and Pat’s static line were both hooked up. Pat was studying his GPS, and as the aircraft entered Iraqi airspace, the green light went on inside the cavernous blacked-out interior, and the aircrew slid the ATV cargo load out the back ramp.

  Pat waited three seconds and chased after his ATV. Ten thousand feet was a very high altitude to conduct a static-line drop, and with the unpredictable winds at such a height, it was impossible to know within a grid square exactly where the cargo load would land. The desert along the Kuwaiti border was unpopulated and clear of most obstacles and man-made structures, so Pat wasn’t really that concerned about where they were going to land. He kept close to the cargo load below him using the toggles on the MC parachute to steer. Most of the jumps he had made in his military career had been free fall, which was a very different experience than static line—the main difference being landing versus crashing. Pat watched the cargo hit the ground, and then he turned into the wind. He kept his feet and knees together and executed a half-decent parachute landing fall on soft sand.

  He cached two of the three five-gallon jerry cans of fuel and the two parachutes after stuffing them into carrier bags, then placed an IR Chemlite on the bag and recorded the location on the NAVAID. He did a walk-around the dune buggy and was reassured to discover that no damage occurred. There was a steady gentle wind. He hopped into the SkyRunner and drove to a small dirt trail only fifty meters from the landing point.

  On the trail, he configured the dune buggy for flight, connecting the airfoil to the two attachment points on the top and distributing the combat load in the driver seat and the small storage area behind the two front seats. He then extended the black airfoil behind the dune buggy, fully extending the risers. He updated the NAVAID, making sure his start point was recorded and verifying the waypoints he had plugged in for the flight.

  The dune buggy had a tri-prop in the rear. The controls were incredibly simple. Turns and elevation changes were accomplished with the steering wheel and the acceleration with the gas pedal. The dashboard had an altimeter, airspeed gauge and a GPS, as well as a transponder, which Pat had deactivated for the mission. Pat’s little runway was in southern Iraq, located a little less than ten miles northwest of Safwan, which was about fifty miles south of Basra and sixty miles north of tonight’s objective in Kuwait City.

  Pat drove south along the trail, gradually picking up speed. When he reached thirty miles per hour, the dune buggy began to lift. Once in the air, he continued to increase speed until he reached forty-five knots. Within minutes he crossed over the Iraqi border fence into Kuwait. Two miles later, he crossed the second fence, which belonged to Kuwait. He dimmed the controls and dropped the night vision goggles from his helmet over his eyes. He remained on a heading of 173 degrees almost due south for fifty-five minutes until he crossed Highway 80, the major north-south highway between Kuwait and Iraq. It was a moonless night, and the visibility was very poor, but with the NVGs Pat could see the road and most landmarks.

  He crossed Highway 80 along Mitla Ridge, the part of Highway 80 named the “highway of death” because during the first Persian Gulf War, a big chunk of Saddam’s Republican Guards had gotten caught retreating along the route by the US Air Force. Pat changed the heading to 145 degrees until he crossed Highway 801 fifteen minutes later and went out over Kuwait Bay. Once over the water, he set his night vision goggles back up into the store position. The bright lights of Kuwait City were directly to his south, and for the last forty minutes of the flight, he would fly using landmarks and his naked eye. The first landmark was the iconic Kuwaiti Tower, the three 150-meter-high white conical spires, with zero, one, and two huge blue balls on them respectively. Pat remained at an altitude of a hundred feet and kept the ATV to the east, off the coast as he passed the prince’s balls, as they were referred to locally.

  Pat’s next landmark was the Marina Mall. Once he reached the mall, he turned over land and turned hard left, following the coastal road until he reached the Regency Hotel. He banked ninety degrees right and followed Nassar Al-Mubarrak for the final half mile of the trip, then increased altitude to 150 feet until he crossed the foliage and green expanse of Rumaytha Park. He confirmed the third-floor windows of the palace were not lit as he began his descent.

  He touched down fifty yards beyond the leading edge of the roof and jammed on the brakes, bringing the dune buggy to a stop with another hundred yards to spare. He temporarily stored the airfoil inside the dune buggy and returned the vehicle to the small side of the rectangle closest to the park. After turning the dune buggy around, Pat shut it off and positioned the airfoil behind the SkyRunner, making it ready for takeoff. He poured the five-gallon jerry can of gasoline into the gas tank, refilling it for the return trip.

  Pat put on his climbing harness and then donned the Wilcox assault pack with the thermal breacher. He also clipped a nylon bag with the Eagle5-NCL handheld see-through-the-wall sensor. The Tialynx Eagle 5 was a radar that could detect the movement of a beating heart ten meters behind a concrete wall. Pat intended to use it through the bathroom door, which should give him ten times that range. He used a grappling hook to connect a rope directly over the third window from the front of the building on the side of the building opposite to the main road. Pat had spent a lot of time recording light patterns inside the palace, and based on the number of windows going on and off at any given time, he was almost positive that he was over the bathroom of the sheik’s master bedroom.

  The sheik had a diwaniya, a traditional Kuwaiti social and business gathering, several nights each week that always broke up late into the early-morning hours. Pat was betting that he was the last family member awake after those meetings, and if that was the case, the room Pat was about to enter had to be part of his apartment. If not, he was in for a seriously bad experience.

  Pat inserted a three-eighths rod into the Hellboy handset, set the oxygen flow, and then stuck the rod into the igniter. While holding the handset in his right hand, he slowly descended to the window ledge, where he locked the descender and attached a levered suction cup to the window to use as a handhold. He stepped to the far right of the ledge and, going from bottom to top, cut through the metal frame of the six-foot-high window in seconds. He switched sides and did the same on the right side. He shut off the oxygen, and as the window began to descend, he rotated it and stepped inside the dark room, intending to gently set down the heavy ballistic glass. Instead, it slipped off the lip and landed on the tile floor with a loud thump. Pat stood still and listened. After a minute, he resumed.

  He removed the assault pack and clipped it to the rope to secure it in position inside the window. He put his night vision goggles over his eyes and turned on his helmet IR light, looking around.

  Pat was in a big bathroom. He walked to the door and placed the Eagle 5 STTW sensor against it. The radar showed a single red dot, signifying only one heartbeat. The target was approximately twenty-five meters away, in the far-left corner from the bathroom door. Pat withdrew the SIG P226 from his holster and screwed on the silencer before quietly opening the door leading into the bedroom.

  He walked to the bed and stopped when he was five feet from his target. The sleeping figure was Sheik Meshal. Pat fired a suppressed subsonic round into the sheik’s head and a second into his heart. The sound of the suppressed discharge was no louder than a hand clap. Pat bent down and retrieved the expended shell casings just as the bedroom door opened. A woman was silhouetted in the doorway against the light of the hallway. She looked at Pat, he looked up at her, and then she started to scream. He raised his pistol, and she ran. He bolted to the bathroom and his exit.

  Pat was outside the window, stepping into the jumar ascenders, when the bathroom door was splintered with submachine gun fire. He fired three
9mm rounds through the door and pumped his arms and legs as fast as he could to climb the rope. While he was climbing over the rooftop, another burst of submachine gun fire erupted from the hole in the window. Pat leaned over the roof and fired down, hitting the gunman’s arms, which were extended through the window opening.

  After tossing his equipment into the SkyRunner, Pat jumped into the driver’s seat. He started the engine and hit the gas, accelerating along the rooftop. He was able to lift off the building with two hundred yards to spare and was clear of the building before any security made it onto the roof. It took another hour and forty-five minutes for him to retrace his route to the original landing zone. Pat spent the whole time with his head on a swivel, looking for helicopters that never came for him. He landed on fumes, used an extra jerry can he had stashed to refuel, and resumed his flight, on a heading to Basra. The flight to Basra International was another fifty miles, and by Pat’s calculations, he would arrive with less than thirty minutes to spare before sunrise.

  At five forty, the SkyRunner cleared the cargo air terminal fence by only ten feet and landed between two hangars. Pat rushed to detach and stow the airfoil and drove up the ramp on the waiting Il-76. The Ukrainian cargo service had been working with him for several years. This was the first time he’d used them for anything except a cargo run. They’d told him early on about the black operations services they offered. He was impressed with the level of professionalism. They asked very few questions and delivered as promised.

  During the descent, Pat asked the loadmaster to drop the ramp. Once the ramp was down, he walked to the end, pulled out his SIG P226, disassembled it, and tossed the pieces out into the depths of the Mediterranean. When the aircraft landed and taxied to the company hangar in Paphos, Cyprus, he helped with the unloading and wished the crew well as they quickly refueled and departed for Ukraine. The hangar was empty of people, with Pat’s guys on a delivery, so he stowed everything himself and locked up.

  Chapter 21

  Abu Dhabi, UAE

  Mike Guthrie sat back in the leather chair, feigning interest in the daily Abu Dhabi newspaper, the National. The small waiting room was well appointed and laid out like something you might expect in a New York City law firm, with thick carpet, dark mahogany and brown leather furniture, and pictures of the senior partners on the wall, which in this case were pictures of Sheik Zayed, the founder and first president of UAE, Sheik Khalifa, his son and the current president, Sheik Mohammed Bin Rashid Al Maktoum, the ruler of Dubai and UAE’s vice president, and Sheik Mohammed Bin Zayed, the crown prince of Abu Dhabi. The crown prince’s brother, Sheik Khalifa, was the president; however, for health reasons, he hadn’t made a public appearance in years. Mike was waiting to visit the most powerful man in the UAE.

  Mike had been waiting for thirty-five minutes and was anxious to meet with the crown prince of Abu Dhabi. HH Mohammad Bin Zayed Al Nayed (MBZ) had requested the meeting personally during a conversation with the American ambassador at his majlis two nights earlier. Because of the eight-hour time difference and fifteen-hour flight time, Mike’s response to the meeting was as swift as it could be. He had met with the sheik on several occasions over the past two years, but this was his first time meeting him in his private office in the Mahmoud government offices on Muroor Street.

  The office manager, wearing traditional local dress, opened the door and signaled for Mike to follow. He led him through the hallway, opened the door to the crown prince’s office, and ushered Mike in. As Mike approached, the sheik stood up and stepped around his desk, greeting him with a handshake. The crown prince led Mike to a seating area. The office was surprisingly modest for a national leader who also happened to be one of the wealthiest men in the world. The sheik was a tall, fit man, with glasses and a well-trimmed beard that was mostly gray. He had a long thin face, with piercing brown eyes and a high forehead. If the strain of the oil crisis and being engaged in two wars was taking its toll on the crown prince, his face and body language didn’t betray it. The man sitting across from Mike exuded energy and a calm confidence.

  After the tea was served and the polite inquiries were completed, the crown prince began the discussion. “We’ve completed the investigation into the death of Sheik Rasheed. The video you provided of his last moments was terribly upsetting. The matter has been closed. I’m satisfied that he and the other members of his cell no longer pose a threat to anyone.”

  “Your Highness, we had a lot of internal discussions about providing you that tape, but ultimately we felt total transparency was essential to putting this matter behind us.”

  The crown prince smiled and took a sip of his black tea. He made eye contact with Mike. “Transparency is an interesting word choice. As partners, we think it best that when these issues are identified by your people within our borders, we are informed before action is taken, not after. These are matters best handled internally and not by outsiders.”

  Mike could see a flash of anger behind the mask of calm and warned himself to tread carefully. “Your concern is well received, Your Highness. Pat Walsh operates on a very loose chain. Officially he doesn’t work for the US government. He has a lot of independence, and his actions caught us by surprise.”

  The sheik gave Mike an incredulous look. “Do you mean to say that your man was operating alone?”

  “Your Highness, that’s exactly the case. Pat’s my friend; I’ve known him a very long time. When he was attacked, and his people were killed, he consulted no one. He sprang into action, and he never informed us of his plan or received permission to execute it.”

  “I didn’t ask you to come here today so you could lie to my face.” When he chose to use it, the crown prince had a very expressive face. Mike could clearly see that this conversation was dangerously close to escalating into a conflict.

  “Your Highness, if you’ll afford me a few minutes, I’ll explain. I am about to go well beyond what my superiors wish to reveal, but I believe it’s the only way to avoid a misunderstanding between us.”

  The sheik nodded.

  “Your Highness, I recruited Pat in Afghanistan to work as an asset for the CIA. The reason I recruited him is because I served with him for many years in the Army, and I trust him. He’s a gifted soldier, but a political novice; that’s why he was eventually forced out of the Army. Despite his lack of political sense, he’s smart. What truly sets him apart is his fierce loyalty.

  “I’ll tell you a war story to help explain. In 1986, Pat and I were together in Honduras on the Nicaraguan border, back in the days when we were fighting communism. We worked along the border, conducting counterterrorism operations against the Sandinistas. Most nights we would depart from our patrol base and occupy ambush positions in four- to six-man teams to ambush the enemy fighters smuggling weapons and supplies across the border.

  “One night, while I was the lead person on my patrol moving to the ambush point, I walked right into an enemy ambush. I was shot twice in the opening volley and went down like a ton of bricks in the middle of the trail. The remainder of my team had to fall back to take cover and return fire.

  “It was triple-canopy jungle, zero light, and both sides were in a long firefight, with me in the middle. Tracers were going everywhere. Pat was two kilometers away, already in his own ambush position with his team, when he heard the firing and a report on the radio from my team that they were engaged and had a man down.

  “Pat left his guys in place and ran in complete darkness toward the sound of the firing, through some of the worst terrain and vegetation in the world. The black palm trees have three-inch needles that completely cover the trunk, and they rip exposed skin to shreds. I’ve never known anyone who’s run through that jungle at night. Pat ran blindly toward the sound of an ambush, and then he ran directly through the enemy fire until he was on top of the ambushers and able to kill every one of them at point-blank range.

  “After he killed the last one, he slung his weapon over his back, picked me up, and ran with me i
n his arms all the way back to the patrol base. That final run was more than three kilometers. The doctor told me later that I’d lost so much blood that if I’d arrived even a few minutes later, I wouldn’t have made it.

  “Pat didn’t give a moment’s thought to what he did. He’s like a shepherd dog. He’s a protector. When the wolf attacks, he responds and attacks right back. The men who directed the attack on his boat crew and the attack on his plane crew probably had no idea of the fury they were unleashing. Sheik Rasheed, Sheik Meshal, and Prince Bandar attacked his people. They killed three members of his team, and he’s not the kind of person to let that go unpunished.”

  The crown prince was a military man. One of his roles was deputy supreme commander of the armed forces, and Mike could see he understood the mentality of people like Pat.

  “Pat’s a force. We can both agree on that. Still, you know him so well. How could you not have predicted his response and given me a warning?” he asked Mike.

  “Your Highness, the first attack against Pat was from the Iranian Navy, the second attack was from the Iraqi Daesh. At most we suspected someone was surveilling Pat from within the UAE. We had no idea it was an element from your own national security and a member of the royal family. If we had, we would’ve notified you immediately. Pat struck too quickly; it was lightning speed. First, he baited the intel guys to search for and arrest the mole, then he snatched the mole, and within hours, he captured, interrogated, and killed the target. We found out about the details of the operation the same way you did. We were sent a copy of the interrogation videos.”

  Sheik Mohammed studied Mike. “I believe you. The rescue of our two SOC operators is proof to me that Pat is the man you describe. Still, he should’ve come to me. I would have solved the problem.”